I love this.

Awww. Thank you for the happy happy ending. :) After Lifted Up, Crashing Down I was wishing there would be a reunion. Then you told me there were in fact two more takes and now you made me happy (again) with this wounderful piece. We could all learn a lot about forgiveness from John. Wish we did...

Oh! Oh! Oh! That is heartbreaking. You're a mean ficfic writer for putting all those feels in one fic... Ok, that was stunningly beautiful and wonderfully penned as always.

That is one of the things I love about this fandom. It can go either way, but friendship and a deep sense of the other is always present. Well done.

Wow. Just wow. I could highlight the entire text. The emotional and physical responses are so real, so honest and complicated.

He looks broken, as if he'd shattered and someone put him back together, but didn't know him the way I do. They didn't put all of the pieces in the right good shock and he'll tear apart again. My return could do that, will do it, if I can't make him understand.
If he walks away he will take the rest of the oxygen with him
I lean down and place my forehead on his, connect and bond, simple physical contact bridging the gap between us./Simple touch accomplishing what I cannot speak...
This. This is how we will purge the last of it from inside./This is where we begin again.

Very powerful with beautiful imagery!

Oh wow... this is amazing! I love your use of italics in here as a way to see both POVs at once. Thank you for this story!

(sniff, sniff)

Stunning
Thanks for sharing

Beautiful. Tender. Healing. Hopeful. Sad. Love. Loss. Redemption... all words that come to mind when reading this story.
I appreciate the way you've interwoven the thoughts of the two. Silent communication. Those moments that pass b/t two people who've known each other intimately - no words; just absorbing each other; 'saying' more than could ever be said with mere words.
Loved the opening line. Sets the tone for the piece perfectly.
"I stand here and he stands there and there is an impossibly wide chasm opening between us. I don't think I can cross it. I think if I move I will fragment and fly apart and not even he, finder of lost things, will be able to find all of the pieces."

sharp edges of my anguish - great description
dialect of sentiments - lovely

Tears... drop onto his face and paint it with the remains of my heartache... my sorrow and pain drains out of me and follows them to the floor - a beautiful combination of words painting the scene with breathtaking emotion.

Beautifully constructed and elegantly penned.
Well done, Ma'am:-)

Mrs P:-)

This is a perfect little capsule, a lozenge if you will, of emotion. It slowly melts through your mind as you read it. John's hurt and betrayal melting through Sherlock's need and finally pools into that great healer forgiveness. A lovely little, classic MLC, package.

I should probably apologise for leaving you with that earworm but actually I'm quite happy I did. You wrote it out and that is a beautiful thing.

Ooowwwwwww. The feelings contained in this are so potent they almost hurt. Thank you so much for this present, MLC! It's so lovely. :) I like how you switched perspectives between John and Sherlock, showing how each man felt and how charged their reunion was.

"He looks broken, as if he'd shattered and someone put him back together, but didn't know him the way I do. They didn't put all of the pieces in the right place." - That was when my heart started pounding. That observation was so raw.

"I want to hit him. I want to hit him so badly and make him feel the pain his death caused, make it manifest itself on his skin, mar that perfection and show the world the sharp edges of my anguish." - This is the best reason why John would hit Sherlock I've ever read. It reminds me of self-mutilation when people are driven to mark themselves just to let the pain out, for visible proof of their suffering that seems to make it somehow better, calms them. That was a great few lines.

" Fingers brush through my hair. I lean into his touch automatically, remembering his caresses, touches I had thought of, clung to when it was bad.
I had forgotten how soft his hair is. How could I have forgotten?" - The way you switched and showed how they both felt. Haunting.

"I move my hand from his cheek to his chin and I tilt it up. I have gone beyond the place where anger resides. I lean in further and brush his lips with mine. Tears I had not realized were in my eyes, drop onto his face and paint it with the remains of my heartache. As they run down his cheeks, my sorrow and pain drains out of me and follows them to the floor.
I feel his tears fall on my face. I feel his slow burning pain leave him. I feel my worry and fear recede. John slides to the floor and wraps his arms around me and his soft tentative kisses, filled with forgiveness and regret for those lost years, turn hungry and demanding. This. This is how we will purge the last of it from inside.
This is where we begin again." - MLC, I have no words for this whole section. I loved it. Simply loved it. Thanks for the great present.

Beautiful! And I will be reading the companion piece very (I hope) soon.

Oh, this is a poignant reunion! This is masterfully written and achingly beautiful to read. My favorite lines:

Simple touch accomplishing what I cannot speak, emotions being the foreign tongue I do not know. Some things are too hard to say, but this dialect of sentiments, this language John speaks so clearly, even I can understand it.

A fantastic Birthday gift indeed!

Oh, MLC, this was beautiful ! Both voices, a perfect look into their brains, and everything so well described I could see it happening and unfolding in front of me.

I love the alternating POVs and the slowly developing forgiveness. Lovely! JJ